


Pillows vs. Blankets

by gayliens



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Community College, Holidays, M/M, Pillow Fights, honestly i don't entirely know what to tag this at all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 16:11:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9131791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gayliens/pseuds/gayliens
Summary: Ransom and Holster's broship is an unbreakable bond, one that has stood the test of time, hockey brawls, and embarrassing drunken kegster confessions. But when a fort-based schism threatens to split the campus in two, will their relationship be salvageable when the feathers and carnage has settled?(based on the Community episode of the same name. Troy and Abed are gay and So Are They)





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aphrie (tumblr user jasico & peach user trk)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=aphrie+%28tumblr+user+jasico+%26+peach+user+trk%29).



> just like huge shoutout to aphrie for this #concept it's so good. watch community.

It all began, as most things did, in the Haus kitchen. Bitty had just shoved a fourth batch of mini mince pies in the oven, and the whole room was filling with the sweet smell of buttery pastry as he hummed serenely along to some generic Christmas carol. He had enlisted Ransom and Holster to help with the washing up, despite their protests that they ‘fully had finals coming up in twenty-four hours, Bits!’

_I mean, it’s not like we were going to study for Intro to Zombies in Literature anyways_ , Ransom thought to himself as he furiously scrubbed at a wooden spoon. It was a cold, bright December day and through the window above the sink he could see the snow on the Haus lawn, glittering in the winter sun. Beside him, Holster was tunelessly harmonising to Bitty’s hums, and the familiar sound of his weird meandering ditty felt so good and solid and right. For a moment, despite all the academic stress weighing on him that had nearly killed him this semester, he felt genuinely at peace. 

And then an egg smashed into the window.

‘HEY!’ Bitty roared as the putrid yolk dripped the down the windowpane.

‘DICKHEADS!’ Holster shouted in agreement.

‘TURDS!’ Ransom chimed in.

‘Fucking lax bros,’ Bitty huffed at normal volume, sounding for all the world like an exasperated Southern grandpa. ‘That’s the third time they’ve egged us this week.’

‘At least they’re not rubbing their cool shit in our faces anymore,’ said Ransom. ‘Remember when Wannabe Flow and Tacky Pink Shoelaces made that giant blanket fort last spring? They wouldn’t shut up about it for months.’

Bitty frowned. ‘That’s the thing that annoys you guys the most?’

‘Um, yeah,’ said Holster. ‘It was fucking awesome. How come we never get to do dope shit like tha-‘

He broke off suddenly, spinning around to meet Ransom’s eyes, and a wicked grin spread across both their faces.

‘Oh, no,’ Bitty clucked. ‘I know that look too well. You’re planning some capital-s-Scheme to prove the intensity of your bromance and I’m going to have to clean up the mess.’

Ransom was only half-listening by this point. He clasped Holster’s hands in his own (did bros hold hands? He didn’t have time to worry about that) and smiled in a way that meant are you thinking what I’m thinking?

‘Giant pillow fort!’ he shouted, at the exact time that Holster said ‘Giant blanket fort!’

He frowned. ‘Pillow’s the obvious choice, right? Stronger, more structural integrity, more originality.’

‘But wouldn’t it be cooler to compete with the lax bros on their own terms? That seems like kind of a cop-out.’

‘Trust me, I’ve been building pro pillow forts since I was a baby. This is going to blow the lax bros out of the water.’

Holster shrugged. ‘Sure thing. What’s one piece of bedding between bros, right?’

Ransom grinned and fist-bumped his friend. ‘Exactly. Now let’s go fuck those lax bros up.’

‘Guys!’ Bitty called after them. ‘This mixing bowl isn’t going to clean itself, you know!’ 

But they were already gone.

***

‘Alright, men,’ said Ransom, spreading out a map of the campus on the dining room table. ‘Here’s the sitch. I have it on reliable intel that the lax bro’s blanket fort last year covered no less than x square feet. We plan to at least double that, so I’m going to need all hands on deck. Whisky, Tango, you guys are on collection duty. I want you to gather every single pillow, cushion, and bundle of down that you can possibly find in the Haus, and then move onto the rest of the campus. Theft is not only acceptable, it is encouraged. Anything goes when it comes to war. Bring them back here, and deposit them on this table. Is that understood?’

‘Yes, sir!’

‘Nursey, Dex, and Chowder – you’re our main construction crew,’ Holster continued. ‘I’m sure you’ve all built many a pillow fort in your time, so now’s the time to shine. Start with the top of the Haus, and when you’ve covered the whole building in pillow fort I want you to move outside and extend it towards the main campus building. Report back to me and Rans for construction plans, which we’ll be drawing up right here in mission control.’

‘Lards and Bitty are going to be security and help us with the management, as well as providing us with sustenance,’ a familiar voice called out from the back. ‘As for the background characters, really just do whatever – it’s one a.m. and the author of this fic can’t even remember if you have names.’

‘Johnson?’ said Ransom incredulously. ‘What are you doing back at Samwell?’

The former goalie shrugged. ‘Narrative convenience.’

‘Anyways,’ Holster continued. ‘We’re not going to lie to you, men. This is going to be one of the most difficult nights of your lives. A marathon twelve hours of uninterrupted pillow fort construction, yelling at people on sports teams who aren’t ours, and blatant shirking of academic responsibility. But at the end of it all, we’ll have undeniable proof of what we’ve always known. Samwell Men’s Hockey are the kings of the campus!’

Bitty picked up a half-empty glass of eggnog from the table, raising it triumphantly in the air. ‘For hockey!’ he proclaimed.

‘FOR HOCKEY!’ 

Ransom clapped his hands commandingly at the team, his eyes fixed on his best friend. ‘Let the construction begin!’

***

Four hours later, the project was in full swing. Ransom and Holster bustled furiously around the immense structure, shouting orders and instructions to the students building up walls around them at a terrifying pace. As the hours had passed, more and more enthusiastic hockey fans had spilled out of their dorms to join the construction team, and the fort was now a veritable microcosm of student life. Ransom had insisted on the fort being not just enormous but also an architectural wonder, and so they were currently weaving around a maze of Doric columns made out of pillows in the quarter supervised by the Greek students. 

Holster had to admit it – this was pretty dope.

‘Extend that wall over there!’ Ransom barked, gesturing wildly to his right. ‘We want to make sure we have space for the Moroccan bazaar in between here and the pyramids.’

‘Yes, sir!’

‘Psst!’ an urgent voice whispered from behind Holster. ‘Birkholtz! Over here!’

He was yanked behind a particularly bulky column by some disembodied hand, and found himself face-to-face with a student. He had a vague, generic-looking face – but one Holster was certain he had seen a million times before, as though he had been sketched into the background. A bright red baseball cap obscured his forehead and eyes, which shone at him with a worrying mix of disgruntlement and menace.

‘Excellent job on the fort, I have to say,’ he muttered. ‘But Adam, Adam, Adam… you and I both know this wasn’t what you wanted.’

‘What do you mean?’

He tutted. ‘This project would be so much more magnificent if Oluransi had only listened to you for once. A blanket fort! A magnificent fortress of billowing fabric! The simplest, most easily constructed, and yet most elegantly beautiful form of fort known to man. We both know that’s your only chance at really blowing the lax team out of the water. ‘

‘So what you’re saying is…’

‘Are you going to stay under the thumb of the Bro Code like you have your whole life? Or are you going to dare to dream? Dare to do something different by breaking away and building the blanket metropolis of your dreams?’

Holster clenched his jaw in frustration. The guy was right. Why should he have to listen to everything Ransom wanted, just because he was gorgeous and hilarious and had an intense personal interest in architecture? It was time for him to take a stand.

‘It’s time for me to take a stand,’ he said angrily. 

The mysterious man’s face cracked into an evil grin. ‘Yes! That’s the spirit! Go out there and realise your dreams. And remember, I was never here.’

‘Hold on a second,’ said Holster as he faded into the shadows. ‘Who are you?’

‘I have no name,’ his voice echoed behind him. ‘No one ever pays attention to poor old me, scowling vindictively in the background of the panel. All you need to know is that there are those who call me… Fry Guy.’

And with that, he vanished.

‘Holtzy!’ a familiar voice boomed from behind him. ‘Bro, I was wondering where you’d got to. Lardo’s planning this whole art gallery expansion into the west end of the quad, and she’s going to hang some still lifes of pillows in there, and – ‘

‘I’m not working with you anymore,’ Holster blurted out suddenly.

Ransom frowned. ‘What?’

‘I said, I’m not working with you anymore. I need to stop living under the thumb of the Bro Code. I’m going to build a blanket fort that will smash this one into goose feathers, and there’s nothing you can do about it.’

‘But Holster, you said a fort was nothing between bros – ‘

‘Attention, citizens of Pillowtown!’ Holster barked into his megaphone, cutting off his friend. ‘If you want to be part of a truly revolutionary project, one that actually stands a chance against the lax bros, meet me in front of the English block to transform campus! If you want to stay in this lame nerd fort, I guess you can do that too.’

Ransom narrowed his eyes. ‘Lame nerd fort, huh? We worked on this all night! This is a fucking work of art! I thought we were friends, Holster.’

‘Sounds like something a lame nerd would say,’ Holster called over his shoulder, already striding out the door.

***

Holster checked his watch. 3 am. It had been a full three hours of working without Justin Oluransi, and he didn’t miss him one single bit. He had built up his own army of obedient tadpoles, bleary-eyed architecture majors, and enthusiastic fans that patrolled the border of his rapidly expanding Blanketsburg, armed with sharpened mini-sticks. Dex was pacing up and down muttering to himself about how he wanted to punch Nursey (who remained a loyal Pillowtown citizen) in his smug, beautiful face. Even Lardo had defected, and was busy knotting blankets into weird, intricate doorways that separated the various segments of the forts. _Who needs that Ransom guy, anyway?_

Just then, Whiskey came tumbling through what he must have thought was a doorway, knocking down three carefully suspended duvets in the process. ‘General Holster, Sir!’ he panted. ‘A message from the Pillowtown camp.’

‘I’m listening.’

‘We have it on reliable intel that the expanding fronts of Pillowtown and Blanketsburg will collide in no less than T-minus five minutes. General Ransom says he is willing to offer you one last chance at reconciliation. If not, he will not hesitate to charge our camp, with every intent to kill.’

Holster clenched his fists. ‘Tell General Ransom that the last thing I’ll ever do is submit to that puny snivelling nerd fort. We march on them in three minutes. Tell the troops to prepare for war.’

***

Bitty bustled out of the campus cafeteria, balancing an enormous Christmas pudding on one hand and holding a sprig of holly in the other. His kitchen had been overrun and devastated by hordes of Pillowtown soldiers, but he’d be darned if that wasn’t going to stop him from feeding the troops. He headed for the centre of the quad, where an almost incoherent text from Ransom had informed him was the centre of both forts’ expansion. It killed him to see his friends arguing with each other, and he reassured himself that everyone was always more cordial on a full stomach.

But no amount of fruit-based Christmas desserts could have calmed the total carnage that awaited him on the quad.

It was a scene of full-on hysteria, athletes and students alike battering each other with bedding so intensely that he was surprised they didn’t crumple on the spot. The tadpoles were rushing around with makeshift stretchers, sweating as they rushed fallen soldiers off the snow-strewn battlefield. He heard an earth-shattering roar from behind him and spun around to see none other than Shitty Knight, bundled head to toe in pillows that were strapped to him like body armour, and waving a hockey stick above his head that glinted ominously in the moonlight.

‘Shitty?’ he called through the confusion. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’

But his voice was drowned out by the horrific screams of battle around him. He spotted Johnson in the midst of the chaos, talking furiously into a microphone and staring into an imaginary camera. He caught a snippet of his news report as he began to duck and weave into the centre of the battle.

‘ – the fandom-infamous ‘Fry Guy’, known hater of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team, has exploited the situation with impressive skill, hell-bent on tearing apart this institution he despises – ‘

He took a deep breath, summoning every molecule of oxygen he possibly could into his tiny body, and then let it all out at once with an immense _**‘Y’ALL!’**_

The effect was instantaneous. Just like that, everyone on the quad dropped their pillows and blankets to the ground, blinking in confusion as though they’d just snapped out of a daze. The echo of Bitty’s voice reverberated between the buildings.

‘Where am I?’ Shitty mumbled, bewildered. ‘How did I – Bitty?’

‘Y’all, this fight is ridiculous,’ Bitty continued. ‘Just link the two forts together! It’ll be, like, one superfort. If we carry on like this, we’ll just tear each other apart. Is that really what anyone wants?’

There were nods and faint murmurs of assent as the assembled crowd started to gather up their blankets, slowly pinning them onto the mouths of the forts to join the two together. Bitty was about to congratulate himself on a job well done and head back to the kitchen to start on this pudding, when he noticed two figures standing resolutely in the centre of the lawn. Ransom and Holster were still half-heartedly beating at each other, their faces blank and numb. Occasionally, they muttered insults of ‘nerd’ or ‘loser’ at each other, but their hearts didn’t seem to be in it.

‘Guys!’ Bitty said. ‘What’s one piece of bedding between bros? It’s all sorted now, right? Why don’t you guys help finish up the fort?’

‘I can’t,’ Holster mumbled. ‘I promised him I’d fight him on this to the death, and a bro doesn’t break his promise.’

‘Yeah,’ Ransom chimed in. ‘This is gonna be the last thing we do together, so I wanna spend as much time as possible killing him.’

He rolled his eyes. He loved the D-men as much as the next Haus resident, but this was getting out of control.

‘Look!’ said Bitty desperately, fishing the piece of holly out from his pocket. ‘It’s – um – best friend mistletoe! Spirit of the season!’ He stretched his arm up to wave it above their heads. ‘Now all you need to do is hug and make u-‘

He broke off. In the split second that he’d looked away, Ransom and Holster had locked their lips together, and were kissing with a fierce intensity that would have made his mama blush. 

‘I mean - ‘he stammered, ‘I guess that – that works too.’

‘This school is so fucking gay,’ said Lardo, appearing seemingly from out of nowhere.

‘Lardo, you’re literally wearing a shirt with the lesbian flag on it.’

'That's fair. Can I have some Christmas pudding?’

‘You know what?’ He waved his arms triumphantly in the air, gesturing to the two passionately embracing defencemen. ‘Christmas pudding for everyone!’ 

Cheers of excitement flooded the night air as Ransom and Holster broke apart, their faces splitting into goofy grins, and extended their arms for the most tender, romantic fistbump that Bitty had ever seen.

‘And now that Holsom is basically canon, I think my work here is done,’ a voice piped up from behind him.

‘Shut up, Johnson.’


End file.
